happier girls

Rodney and I survived our 5 year wedding anniversary earlier this month. I say "survived" because our girls made our day a very memorable one. Rodney had been in Pennsylvania the three days leading up to our anniversary; they were some of my most challenging parenting days to date. Hannah was fussy, gassy, not sleeping well. And when the littlest one consumes more than 50% of my energy, the older one pushes the limits and skips her naps. Sigh. After many hours of crying, Hannah finally fell asleep around 4pm. We ordered take out Chinese and snuggled on the couch, enjoying a movie.

In many ways, it was a fitting 5 year anniversary celebration. At the end of a very LONG day, we laughed about our wedding, remembering how young and naive we were. Looking back we remembered how much we loved each other then and thanked God that we are are so blessed to love eachother even more now! I am so thankful that the Lord brought Rodney into my life. He is my best friend.

After several challenging days with a gassy, fussy baby, I decided to cut out dairy, chocolate and caffeine. Yes, this has been very difficult for me. I LOVE cheese, cappuccinos, milk, and Blue Bell ice cream. The two great benefits of cutting these foods out - a happy baby (the best benefit hands down) and post-partum weight loss (trying to look for the good in the situation). Hannah does seem less gassy and more content. So for the time being, I'm going to stick to a no dairy, chocolate, caffeine diet.

And since Hannah is happy and more content. so is Abigail:) Granted we still have our challenging days, and I most certainly have moments every day where I have to stop, breathe and send up a quick prayer to the Lord.

Here are some "happier" pictures of the girls.

By the way, I cut the butter and milk out of my cornbread recipe (subsituting canola oil and almond milk). The dairy-free cornbread made a nice addition to my chicken chili. I'm learning with some extra effort, dairy free is really quite manageable!